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a Public-private ICT research community

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Inreda Diabetic

The mission of Inreda Diabetic is to bring a bi-hormonal artificial pancreas system to the home of the patients. Our aim is to improve the treatment of diabetes and the quality of life which will finally lead to lower societal costs.

Treatment
During the treatment of diabetes type 1, it is crucial to avoid extreme low blood glucose values, and to keep these values as ‘normal’ as possible over time. If not, acute complications (hypo’s and hyper’s) and chronic complications (dementia, kidney failure, blindness, etc.) may occur.

The goal of the artificial pancreas is to control and regulate the blood glucose values. For this purpose, the system of Inreda Diabetic is bi-hormonal (insulin and glucagon). This means that two sensors are used to improve the accuracy of the blood glucose measurements. To enhance the treatment, the device consists of alarms to warn the patient and it collects data that are provided to the patient and health care professionals regularly.

Quality of life
The physical complications are not the only consequences of diabetes. Diabetes can also result in a lower quality of life. During the treatment of their disease, diabetic patients have to take into account a number of factors: diet and exercise requirements, normal and stable blood glucose values, a strict treatment regime, and they have to learn to cope with the nasty complications. All this has a strong impact on their daily lives.

The artificial pancreas is a fully automated system. The main advantage is that the quality of life can be improved considerably. The use of the artificial pancreas means that diabetic patients have full diet and exercise freedom. Also, compared to a regular treatment, less finger pricks are needed – only for the calibration of the sensors.

Health care costs
In 2010, there were 285 million patients with diabetes worldwide. This number is expected to increase to 438 million in 2030 [1]. Of this number, about 10 percent are type 1 diabetes patients. This group bears a substantial part of the societal burden associated with diabetes. These costs were estimated at $376 billion worldwide in 2010, and are expected to raise to $490 billion by 2030 [1]. This increase is caused by a growing prevalence and a rising number of diabetes related complications.

The artificial pancreas helps patients to achieve ‘normal’ and stable blood glucose values. It is expected that this will prevent a large number of the diabetes related complications from occurrence, or decrease the severity of the complications. Therefore, the artificial pancreas has the potential to reduce the health care cost associated with diabetes considerably.